An Ilkeston shop keeper and his employee have been sentenced to a total of 230 hours unpaid work and £1,550 costs after pleading guilty to possessing and selling illegal tobacco.

The case is the latest success for Derbyshire County Council’s trading standards team which brought the prosecutions following raids at Eight til Eight on Nottingham Road, Ilkeston, run by Khalil Omar Ali Daloyi.

At Derby Crown Court this week (Thurs 11 October), he was sentenced to 150 hours unpaid work, £85 victim surcharge and £690 costs for the offences.

He appeared alongside Hawal Hussein, 34, of Dryden Street, Derby, who pleaded guilty to five charges of possessing counterfeit tobacco. He received a sentence of 80 hours unpaid work, £85 victim surcharge and £690 costs.

Daloyi ran the shop and Hussein was working in the shop at the time that some of the offences were committed.

County council trading standards officers, working with Derbyshire Police, raided the shop on three separate occasions, in April, July and August 2017, following complaints from the public.

They seized illegal tobacco with an approximate retail value of £5,700, as well as making a test purchase of fake goods in January 2017.

In two instances Hussein attempted to escape with the illegal cigarettes from the back of the shop but was stopped by officers on both occasions.

Those fake packets of cigarettes were priced at £3.50 per pack, illegally branded as Richmond, Marlboro and Mayfair.

Derbyshire County Council’s Cabinet Member for Health and Communities Councillor Carol Hart said: “This is another successful prosecution for our trading standards team and sends out a strong message to traders selling counterfeit and unsafe tobacco that they will not get away with their actions.

“Information we get from the public is vital and we want these traders to know we will catch them and we will prosecute them.